can you imagine the bill!

[birdiemachine]

Fingers crossed mate. What a saga.

[irishmike]

Best of luck, hopefully that's the end of it!

[DuncanF]

I'm kind of scratching my head here. 200 miles put on over the w/end and all was well ... until I picked up an EMU warning this morning. Quick chat with Audi and I'm OK to go about my day, just pop in to see them on the way home. VCDS was plugged in and the warning is that the engine is now running lean. There is a problem with the mass air flow sensor, which also explains Sport mode is not doing what it should. Part ordered, one hour to fit it when it arrives.

But here is where the head scratching comes in .... given that the MAF took a bath when half a bloody river went though it when water was ingested on New year's Day, did it not occur to them to check it out? And until now I've just assumed that the air filter was replaced as it too took a bath, but do I need to ask this obvious question?

You really, really could not make this up!

[Tacko]

Sounds like your having a right nightmare mate. I would defiantly question it. With such a big job it may have slipped someones mind!

[DuncanF]

This is like a tragic soap opera. The mass air flow meter has been replaced and the open/close vacuum commands are now being sent to the exhaust flaps. But these had seized during the car's lay up, possibly as a result of having water in them from the accident, and no heat to drive that off. One of the flaps has been freed up and now responds to the sport button press, the other is now locked open.

To replace the flaps means cutting the exhaust and tacking on new baffle boxes/flaps on both sides at a cost of £750 per side! FFS!! We now start to get into a bun fight as to who pays. These were working just fine on New Year's Day so from my POV it's down to the insurance company to cough up. Or Audi Watford who seem, in their excitement to get to grips with a V8 rebuild, to have overlooked collateral damage from the water immersion, and did not price that into the job quote.

LV= may take the view that a) the claim is closed and b) this is wear/tear. My take is that if the car had been running, the heat in the exhaust/gasses would have driven off any standing water after the car was immersed. Audi are going to see what they can do via the claim.

I've asked the question "if water made it through to the exhaust, did it damage the catalytic converter"? The MOT emissions test says no, but is that the full story? Audi tell me the catalytic converter "breathes" to release moisture which is part of the catalytic process but this is a level of tech knowledge that s beyond me. Can anyone verify what I am being told?

And apart from: air filter, mass air flow metre, piston/cylinder, cat. converter, exhaust flaps, are their any other components in the path from air intake to exhaust that could have come a cropper from the water passing through the path normally taken by air/exhaust gasses?

My position of "fix it at your cost" is weakened as I paid the bill last week when picking it up, and the insurance company bill has been lodged by Audi.

[RS4_Ollie]

I know its probably not what you want to do but its easy enough to work them free again with mole grips and a can of wd40, would save £750 and cutting the exhaust

[DuncanF]

Hi Ollie, I don't need them replaced, just put back to working order.

In the seized one there are cracks around the "collar" where the "axle" pushes through on the other. My quotes are due to my lack of understanding what I'm looking at when I was shown the car on the ramp earlier. Any idea where I can find an exploded diagram so I can get my head around the flaps?

They have freed the N/S, so I presume that when they tell me they cannot free/lube the O/S they have explored the molegrip option? A diagram for the stupid (me!) would help me understand what is involved.

[JCviggen]

Highly unlikely any water made it into the cats. Easy for the exhaust flaps to seize up. I imagine there is a good chance the right person could revive the flap that is currently stuck open, but are these flaps worth fighting over in the first place? If you're fully catted the exhaust is pretty quiet regardless of whether the valves are open or closed. Heck mine are open all the time now because all the opening and closing drove me nuts. Their behavior in S mode doesn't make much sense if you ask me. Then again you might like it. In which case I'd suggest the path of least resistance and have an outside specialist look at it. The uphill battle to let Audi sort it out doesn't seem worth all the time, effort and arguing which could be spent enjoying the car.

[psglas]

Were the flaps working before the incident ?

[DuncanF]

Were the flaps working before the incident ?

Yes. This is why I am pushing to fix this, relatively, minor fault.

[DuncanF]

Well she's back. Let's hope it is fourth time lucky!

I think Audi Watford are loosing the will to live. They considered approaches to getting replacement exhaust boxes via a continuance of the claim, but I think gave up. In the end they took the cost themselves. £1500. Ouch!

I think there are valuable lessons for them to learn here. They seemed to get such a hard on for a V8 rebuild (who wouldn't!) that they failed to think about collateral water damage and add that to the claim. From what I can see LV= picked up £10500 and Audi c. £4500 in parts (prop shaft, MAF meter, exhausts), free warranties, free service, free MOT etc., and that does not include various loan cars for nearly four months. Some of the latter will land on Audi UK to compensate for the "bad" short block and the time it took to figure out what was wrong. After the insurance excess payment, my bill was £244 for a new clutch.

If they'd spotted all the faults up front, LV= would have killed the car as an uneconomic repair, I would have had a pay out, and Audi would have had a deposit on some new vehicle, and a profit from the sale of that to boot.

Having said that, I'm really pleased she is still on the road.

[birdiemachine]

Doesn't matter mate, b7 rs4 is ten times the car of the b8 and s4, it's a guaranteed future classic, happy to see it kept on the road, they are the last of a dying breed. Hope your finally out the other side and can enjoy her!!!!

[HYFR]

If the dealer passed a £10k labour bill to the insurance co then at 80% GP I am sure they have a big smile on their face

[DuncanF]

If the dealer passed a £10k labour bill to the insurance co then at 80% GP I am sure they have a big smile on their face

I'm sure there was a profit, but not 80%. The £10.5k included the short block. And the first quote was over £12k which was LV='s cut off. They massaged the labour rate to bring in into "doable" range. But at the cost of not looking for other faults ...